Cambridge, Ontario
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Cambridge

Cambridge drinking water hardness is 156 mg/L on OpenStats, plus City Score rankings and local readings.

Civic arena · hometown HUD

Cambridge

City138k pop
57XP
#65

#65 of 343

57% City Score XP

Dropping
City Score XP

7/8 pillars on the board

57%#65

Decade trail

Cambridge packs 7 of eight open-data pillars into its composite standing. Tap a rival below to see how the hometown stacks up head-to-head.

Cambridge drinking water

Regional estimate from nearest municipal sample

Hardness, pH, and lead from municipal reports on the OpenStats water atlas. This page uses a regional estimate — open the water atlas for method notes.

Hardness
156 mg/L
hard
pH
7.4
Lead
0.4 μg/L

Full Cambridge water quality report →City Score rankingsCompare cities · vs Caledon · vs Haldimand CountyHardness guide

Watershed to tap · system map

How Cambridge's water works

Source, treatment, and distribution for Cambridge from municipal and provincial water records. Open the animated map for the full watershed-to-tap diagram — no nested topic navigation here.

Local numbers for Cambridge

Permits, tax, internet, radon, hazards, drinking water, and sports rankings where a CHL hometown applies.

How Cambridge scores

Dropping−35

Cambridge sits at City Score rank #65 with a standing of 57%, from 7 of 8 open-data pillars (tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, growth, safety). Missing pillars score at median standing so thin coverage cannot inflate the rank. Dropping 35 places versus 2022 (#30 → #65).

Latest owned placements: indoor radon rank #252 of 327 at 65 Bq/m³ survey mean; residential mill rate rank #36 of 57 (13.03 mill rate). Full tables and method notes live on each study edition; atlas readings for the same slug open from the topic buttons.

In the 2025 City Score edition, Cambridge carries a City Score standing of 57% (rank #65 of 343) with 7 of 8 pillars observed. That sits 4 points above the Ontario peer average across 123 ranked cities. Within Ontario, Cambridge ranks #36 of 123 on City Score.

The strongest signal in the current chart is indoor radon (standing 77%, rank #252 of 327, raw score 65). The weakest observed pillar is population growth (standing 34%, rank #228 of 343). Crime severity uses the Statistics Canada police-service CSI mapped to Waterloo Regional Police Service (StatCan metro police area) (table 35100026), not a regional proxy.

Drinking-water hardness on the water atlas reads 156 mg/L as CaCO₃ for Cambridge. Compare that figure to the hardness pillar on the chart and to the national hardness guide on the hub.

#65
Arena rank (of 343)
57%
City Score
7
Pillars observed
Dropping−35
vs 2022
#30 → #65

Arena loadout

Topic XP bars

Arena rank #65 of 343

City Score

7/8 pillars · main XP bar

57%#65
Drinking water

Pillar avg · hardness #186

50%
Building permits

No placement

—
Internet

Rank #81

77%
Radon

Rank #252

77%
Hazards

Rank #156

45%
Property tax

Rank #36

63%

Cambridge pillar standing

Eight equal-weight City Score pillars, 2025 panel year.

TaxPermitsNetRadonWaterHazardsGrowthCrime

Source: OpenStats composite / study editions

City Score standing trend

Standing percentage by panel year (higher is better).

Years: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025

Source: OpenStats composite timeseries

Achievements

Dropping -35

Hometown notes

City profile

Older hometown notes stay on the desk archive (noindex) — this section shows recent highlights only.

Cambridge in brief

Cambridge tells outsiders one name and locals three. Municipal history is clear that Galt, Preston, and Hespeler were pushed into one city in 1973, and that people still introduce themselves by the old towns first. Tourism pages call them three distinct urban areas along Grand River frontage inside Waterloo Region, with Blair folded into the story earlier through Preston. Highway 401 and Hespeler Road keep the city plugged into the rest of southern Ontario, while Grand River Transit knits trips between the cores. You're at home here is the municipal welcome line, and it only works if you accept that home still has three front doors.

Saturday mornings still orbit the Cambridge Farmers' Market at 40 Dickson Street beside City Hall in the Galt area, a market the city dates to about 1830. Cambridge Summer Live! fills warm evenings with free concerts and movie nights. Hill 60 Park turns up when residents are asked to help pick a new playground. Service Cambridge handles the unglamorous errands, from licences to service requests, and the Holiday Market lands on the civic calendar each winter. Between the rivers and the market stalls, the city feels less like a suburb of somewhere else and more like neighbouring mill towns that finally share a tax bill.

Cambridge Times covers the Hespeler Road commute and runs a Best of Cambridge vote that treats the whole amalgamation as one shopping map. Speed River geography still matters in Preston and Hespeler the way the Grand does in Galt. On OpenStats City Score for 2025, Cambridge sits at rank 92 of 343. The hometown test is simple: if someone says they are from Hespeler, they mean it.

Drawn from City of Cambridge - Local History, City of Cambridge - Tourism, City of Cambridge - Farmers' Market, Cambridge Times.

City Score over time

City Score from 2016–2025 across eight open-data pillars. Individual study placements are listed in the panels below.

0%25%50%75%100%2016201720182019202020212022202320242025
OpenStats City Score

Rankings for Cambridge

Each study below is its own ranking. Where a study has more than one edition for this city, the chart shows standing across those years only.

Connectivity · OpenStats

OpenStats Broadband Download Speeds

OpenStats

Cities ranked by household-weighted maximum advertised download (Mbps) from ISED National Broadband Data hex ISP rows, with hex-to-city assignment by population-weighted gravity. The headline 2025 score is the dwelling-weighted mean of per-hex technology ceilings (fibre and cable at 1 Gbps, DSL lower). Household-weighted 50/10 availability (%) is stored on atlas rows as avail_5010_pct. Earlier panel years backcast along a national speed curve with city-specific fiber and availability paths.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#81
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 905.3

Composite · OpenStats

OpenStats City Score

OpenStats

Dimensional average of OpenStats open-data pillars for each panel year 2016-2025: tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, population growth, and crime severity. Each series is scored 0-1 within its edition; series in the same pillar are averaged, then all eight pillars are averaged with equal weight. Missing pillars score at median standing (0.5). Crime severity uses StatCan police-service CSI only (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01); cities without a police-service match take median standing on the safety pillar. Growth uses StatCan CSD estimates; construction uses verified municipal building-permit value per resident (population field on each city record, 2021 Census vintage); mill rates and broadband use live rows plus documented year-varying estimates where needed. Radon, water, and PGA may be survey/model vintages carried forward and are flagged when static for more than two years. External commercial livability lists are never inputs.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#65
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.565

Safety · OpenStats

OpenStats Crime Severity Index

OpenStats

Communities ranked by Statistics Canada Crime Severity Index at police-service grain (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01 for British Columbia). Rank 1 is highest CSI (worse). Cities without a police-service match are not listed; the safety pillar scores at median standing on City Score. Hometown pages name the police service and reference year.

CSI from Waterloo Regional Police Service (StatCan metro police area) (2025, Table 35-10-0026-01).

10 editions · 2016–2025

#57
Latest · 2025 · of 102
Score 66.82

Water · OpenStats

OpenStats Drinking Water Hardness

OpenStats

Communities ranked by municipal drinking-water hardness (mg/L as CaCO₃). Hardness changes slowly; the atlas vintage is carried across panel years and flagged when static for more than two years.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#186
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 156

Health · OpenStats

OpenStats Highest Indoor Radon

OpenStats

Communities ranked by Health Canada survey mean indoor radon (Bq/m³). Rank 1 is the highest mean. Decade panel years without a new survey carry the CMA survey vintage forward; they are not annual retests.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#252
Latest · 2025 · of 327
Score 65

Growth · OpenStats

OpenStats Population Growth

OpenStats

Cities ranked by year-over-year population growth from Statistics Canada annual CSD estimates (Table 17-10-0155-01). Rank 1 is fastest growth. A few places without a clean CSD match use a provincial-path estimate anchored to seed population.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#228
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.006280351991820937

Property tax · OpenStats

OpenStats Residential Mill Rates

OpenStats

Municipalities ranked by residential mill rate (education levies are shown on property-tax pages but not added here). Rank 1 is the highest rate. Atlas seed and published municipal rows anchor the panel; off-panel tax years (e.g. 2026) carry across 2016–2025; remaining gaps follow provincial paths.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#36
Latest · 2025 · of 57
Score 13.03

Hazards · OpenStats

OpenStats Seismic Hazard (PGA)

OpenStats

Communities ranked by NRCan peak ground acceleration (higher = stronger shaking hazard). Rank 1 is highest PGA. The seismic model is multi-year; values are carried across the City Score panel and flagged as static until NRCan publishes a new generation.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#156
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.049

Worth knowing in Cambridge

Distinctive local notes and places, each linked to its source.

  • Municipal history says residents often tell each other they are from Galt, Preston, or Hespeler even while calling Cambridge home to outsiders.

    City of Cambridge - Local History

  • Cambridge Summer Live! stages free outdoor concerts, movie nights, and busker-style shows through the warm months.

    City of Cambridge

  • Tourism pages frame the city as three distinct urban areas with Grand River frontage inside Waterloo Region.

    City of Cambridge - Tourism

Places to see

Cambridge Farmers' Market

Year-round Saturday market at 40 Dickson Street in the Galt area. Directions still send you down Hespeler Road from the 401 and into downtown by Water Street.

Grand River frontage

Municipal tourism leads with scenic Grand River frontage tying the historic cores together. It is the outdoor spine locals point to when explaining why the amalgamation still feels like river towns.

Hill 60 Park

A neighbourhood park that recently asked residents to help choose the next playground design. Small civic choices like that keep the city feeling local between the three cores.

Follow Cambridge by email

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